IMF: U.S. recovery will power global economic growth

The U.S. economic recovery has yet to take off in earnest, but the nation is the gold standard in the 2014 world economy, according to the International Monetary Fund.

The U.S. this year will largely drive the global economy to its strongest gains since the Great Recession, the IMF predicted Tuesday.

USA TODAY’s Paul Davidson, who covered the IMF’s press briefing Tuesday morning, reports the IMF cited rising household wealth, more modest federal government cutbacks and the housing recovery as factors that will push U.S. economic growth to 2.8% this year from 1.9% in 2013.

The world economy is forecast to grow 3.6%, a tad less than the IMF’s 3.7% prediction in January, but up from 3% last year.

“The (global) recovery remains uneven,” IMF chief economist Olivier Blanchard told reporters in advance of the meetings by the IMF and the World Bank in Washington this week. “It’s strongest in the U.S.”

Advanced economies overall are expected to grow 2.3%. The eurozone area is beset with low inflation that could derail its projected 1.2% growth in 2014 after years of recession, Blanchard said.

Emerging markets such as China and Brazil are expected to grow 4.9%, but that’s slower than last year’s 4.7% pace. The pullback partly stems from the U.S. Federal Reserve’s gradual reduction of its bond-buying initiative, which is pushing up U.S. interest rates and making emerging-market investments less appealing.

Japan is projected to expand 1.4% on the strength of its own bond-buying stimulus. But a recent increase in the sales tax from 5% to 8% is likely to crimp consumer spending.